


The Life And Undeath Of Takashi Shirogane

by ClockworkRainbow



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Modern with Magic, Major Character Undeath, Multi, discontinued, tagging it multi but it's not that shippy really, twenty two days into October I'm finally writing some goshdanged monster mash
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-10-22
Updated: 2018-11-30
Packaged: 2019-08-05 22:42:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 15,042
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16376399
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClockworkRainbow/pseuds/ClockworkRainbow
Summary: Garter Creek has never exactly been a normal town, and the people that live there have never exactly been normal people, but there was a solid while where everything was pretending to be normal, which just made what followed very, very rude.Alternatively: after the unexpected death of his fiance, Adam finds himself the pseudo-avuncular caretaker of a werewolf. Things go downhill from there.





	1. The Immediate Aftermath Of The Funeral

            After the funeral, he came home to find something on his doorstep that only the very creative or very unobservant would call a dog.

            It was difficult to tell details, considering the whole lanky, spindly mass of the thing was wadded into a very small, very miserable ball, but Adam had seen this before, and he’d seen enough to _recognize_.

            “You know, you’re really lucky my neighbor didn’t call animal control.” Mrs. Muriel, as it happened, was a recent widow, and rather terrified of finding her way in the world, and most of the creatures in it, in particular any dog larger than the nearly pocket-sized trotting pug that her late husband had sold her on.

            The mass whimpered quietly. In that moment, he placed the large, squashy mass of woebegone fabric next to its head.

            Adam pinched the bridge of his nose, breathed deeply, counted back from ten.

            He did not need this now. He wasn’t Takashi. He wasn’t even sure if that was a quality he’d admired in the other man, constantly shouldering the world like that. He barely knew the _kid_ , they’d talked about as often as he’d seen him like this.

            Takashi had been content to let it be _his_ problem and nobody else’s. Like his paycheck had more than enough room to take care of two people.

            He did not need this now.

            The problem was someone else did.

            All of the breathing and counting he did escaped his mouth in one final, frustrated sigh, and he stretched over the pile on his doormat to unlock the house. “Come on.”

            The kid moved cautiously, sniffing at the air, head side to side, and for the moment that was a very animal movement, the kind that let you wholly forget there was a person in there. The rueful, ears-lowered look he gave back at Adam before sheepishly swiping a forepaw at the boot scraper a few times was not.

            “You probably need a bath.”

            An understated grunt, and a few wandering steps before another pause.

            “…Second door on your right, down the hall. There’s towels in the closet.”

            The tail disappeared around the corner, just as it hit Adam he wasn’t sure how well he could open doors like that.

            Experimentally, he hefted the duffel bag the kid had brought with him. It felt both heavy enough, and too light, to be just about everything he owned.

            …Right. It wasn’t exactly like Takashi’s apartment was going to be available any more.

            For now, he put the bag in the living room, got a paper towel and picked up the bigger pieces of dried mud that had been shed. The bathroom door was closed, and the closet slightly ajar, which answered his question, he guessed.

            Adam sank into a chair, pushing his glasses up on his fingers to rub his eyes. He’d just sort of wanted to be alone today- too many people after the funeral had tried to invite him out to a bar (“I don’t drink,”) to _something_ , warm consoling words that he wasn’t alone, that he’d spoken beautifully.

            He’d stood at a podium and spit words in some attempt at order while his fiancé rotted in a casket next to him. The pieces of him they’d even been able to _find_.

            That wasn’t something that he needed compliments _or_ pity over.

            No, he actually didn’t want to be alone, today, but the things that he wanted weren’t exceptionally reasonable, or realistic, and this was from someone who currently had a werewolf- by the sound of the water- taking a shower in his house.

            Life really just didn’t care, did it. Scientifically, he knew they lived in a vast, cold, wholly indifferent universe but sometimes it just had to go and rub it in.

            After a while, the water stopped, and a dark-colored, still-dripping mop of hair stuck itself around the corner. This time it was attached to a fairly human face. “Uh,” he said.

            It took Adam longer than in hindsight, it really should have. “-Oh.” He got up and brought the bag over. “Right. Clothes.”

            The kid accepted his possessions gingerly, frowning down at them. “I rented that suit.”

            Suit- right. He’d seen him lingering around the service, not talking to anyone, looking mostly miserable. “What happened to it?”

            “Me.”

            “I figured, I meant-”

            “It’s in a bunch of pieces in the woods right now, and I don’t want to think about it, okay?” He ducked back behind the door, and it closed.

            Oh, that could have gone better.

            Admittedly it could have also gone worse. He went back to his chair, and then, in hindsight, got up and went into the kitchen and started getting the stuff out for cocoa.

            The calendar had an anniversary written neatly on it in pen.

            Adam pulled the page off, crumpled it and binned it. Fuck October. They were skipping the rest of October this year. It was the single pettiest decision he’d made all day, and it felt _fantastic_.

            By the time he had two mugs on the coffee table, the kid had reemerged, dressed now in a relatively new-looking shirt, pants that edged on outgrown, and a woebegone hoodie whose pockets had enough holes that in the process of fidgeting, he stuck his thumb out of most of them. He plunked himself into the far seat, gingerly accepted the cup and almost immediately burned his tongue on it.

            What was the kid’s name? Kevin- no, _Keith_. He said it, once, and was rewarded when the kid simply looked up, a little expectantly.

            “I’m not gonna stay here forever,” he said quickly, defensively. “I just… I needed to get out. I couldn’t stay there. I thought I could handle it but everything still smells like him.”

            Oh.

            Keith forged forwards, undeterred, or simply not reading the look on Adam’s face. “I’ve got enough I’ve saved up from busking. I’ll take a bus back down to Arizona. See if I can’t figure out… something. I know where the shelters are down there, at least.”

            And just like that, it didn’t have to be his problem. He could walk this off. Forget that he’d ever actually known a werewolf. Life could tidy up its edges, he could move forwards, and maybe, eventually, it wouldn’t even hurt.

            God, that sounded nice. That was the thing, you always had the option to ignore it. To not think about all the obvious holes in his plan. Or the empty way he said he’d figure out _something_.

            “You can stay.”

            “You said your neighbor-”

            “Isn’t going to know, unless you run around in the back yard like that or eat her dog. I don’t regularly have her over for tea.”

            His own salary wasn’t that much better than Takashi’s. There were considerations. Did this kid even own a toothbrush? The couch was a start, but, that was a temporary fix. He had a guest room, given it was completely unfurnished.

            And the kid was, y’know, literally a werewolf, if the fact that he’d shown up with four legs and nearly the size of a horse was an indication.

            He didn’t actually know what the hell he was doing, but he’d already decided it was his problem, and that was the difficult part, really.

            Well, that was a lie. Everything that was going to come out of this was the difficult part. In fact, he had a distinct, sneaking suspicion that this was going to get worse somehow.

* * *

 

            The first thing Shiro was aware of was a distinguishingly large woman with a tattooed face leaning on a shovel, staring down at him.

            The sound of snapping bubblegum drew his attention to the other side of the pit, where a girl in an orange hijab leaned over the side. “So… hey,” she said, the moonlight glinting off of yellow glasses. “Are you dead?”

            Shiro found his voice.

            “ _What_?”


	2. The Elephant In The Room

            His nerves made it all the way into the afternoon before he had to go.

            Do what, he didn’t know exactly. He was halfway up the block before he realized he’d taken his violin with him on reflex, so, that answered that, he guessed. Adam’s neighborhood was a little nicer, further from the city, from his usual performance spots. He didn’t really want to risk being caught somewhere you weren’t supposed to loiter, so he’d just hoof it, he guessed.

            This turned out to be a mistake. Walking gave him time to think.

            _“Do you know if you have food allergies?”_

_“What?”_

_Adam simply returned his stare. “Allergies. I cook. I don’t want to kill you. I’m guessing you don’t live entirely on raw meat.” A pause. “I’m_ hoping _you don’t live entirely on raw meat.”_

 _“I_ don’t _.” Now really wasn’t a time to mention the roadkill Incident. “The meat thing, I mean. I dunno about allergies.”_

_“You don’t know.”_

_“Look, I’m broke. And I turn into a dog. I’ve eaten a lot of stuff that I probably shouldn’t have. I don’t keep tabs on it.”_

_Adam was watching him through his glasses. Keith had no idea what that facial expression was supposed to mean. This wasn’t Shiro._

_The thought twisted in his stomach like a knife. He had to say something. “It wasn’t me.”_

_“What?”_

_“I didn’t do it. Shiro- the news- I heard what they said about him. That it was a wild animal, but there’s nothing that big around here. It wasn’t me. You have to_ believe _it wasn’t me.”_

_Adam’s cup came down fast and hard on the table. Keith flinched at the sound- but nothing else was forthcoming. The hand that held the cup was shaking slightly, but Adam wasn’t looking at Keith. It didn’t seem like he was looking at anything._

_The knife was gone. Nausea filled the cavity instead._

_It was the last discussion they’d had about it._

            He really just had a way to fuck up, didn’t he? The off chance he might not _have_ to leave Garter Creek- that he could at least live in a town that remembered Shiro, a place he’d at least kidded himself about belonging in- and he had to open his stupid mouth.

            That was always how it worked, wasn’t it. Good kids didn’t stay at the home. Good kids didn’t grow up into loudmouth teenagers that ran north until one of the drivers that they hitched a ride on robbed them. Good kids were blonde and freckled and cute and healthy, they were not gaunt children with wolves’ eyes who could eat and _eat_ and never quite run out of hunger, who came in from the night covered in mud and smelling like something dead, who couldn’t sleep at all when the moon turned fat and full and left his heart pounding in his ears.

            Shiro had made him feel like those things didn’t matter so much. The first time he’d _turned_ , clawed at the door desperate to get out off the street, crawled in because everything was hurting with the force of holding himself inside his own skin- he was sure that patience had limits, that Shiro would have been terrified.

            Instead, it had just been… okay. He’d slept the night, woke up groggy in the morning tucked into someone else’s bed, with Shiro dozing in a chair next to him.

            They’d talked, of course. And Shiro had asked hard questions- questions he’d never even thought of before, that left him clawing at the recollections of his father, of the house, of the phantom that snuck into his dreams sometimes that he thought might have been his mother. Tall, but everyone looked tall to a baby. Beautiful, his father had said, wistfully, staring at the horizon line. Beautiful, and just a little scary, but in the way that wild things are.

            Being able to talk about it at all had been magical. In hindsight, it was a lucky break, and not one he was going to get again. Trying to stumble back into that pattern with Adam had just made everything worse.

            He looked at the violin case, and sighed.

            “Something the matter?”

            “If I’d taken the bag with me, I could’ve just left. Now I’ve gotta go back, and- hope he hasn’t thrown it away by now.”

            “Dear boy, it’s much for the better that you haven’t. It would’ve created a _problem_.”

            He wondered what Shiro meant by that. That wasn’t the usual way he phrased things- or-

            Keith wheeled, backed up until his spine hit a brick wall and tore free of the hand that had been resting on his shoulder. “ _Who the fuck are you_.”

            The man smiled at him, the way that one folds only their lips, without actually shifting the skin around his eyes. He was tall, with sharp cheekbones and a sharp chin touched with a single, neatly-combed brushstroke of a beard, and his pale skin had an ashy undertone. “Ah,” he said, as if merely amused. “You were so lost in thought, I didn’t think to disturb you.”

            They were half a block away from where Keith usually played, in the wrong direction. How long had he been walking with this guy? The hair on the back of Keith’s neck prickled all the way down to between his shoulder blades. “Yeah, well you _did_.”

            The man fiddled with his cufflinks. “Well, then. I’ll simply settle my business and be out of your hair in a moment.”

            There was something wrong with the man’s voice. It flowed with a bit more sinew than ink, felt as if it _slithered_ through the air. He listened to it when he didn’t want to, when the itch to run was prowling the muscles of his legs like an animal in a cage, he wasn’t safe here, he needed to _go_ -

            Another one of those very contained smiles. “You see, boy, there’s been something of a misunderstanding. An _associate_ of mine bungled a certain operation, and something was left in your keeping that has no business being there. It’s a burden to you, and you’re _certainly_ better off without it.” He produced a pianist’s hand, spidery fingers uncurling. “So, if you don’t mind terribly.”

            Yeah, actually, he did. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

            “Do you?” The man’s eyes glinted. He stepped forwards.

            Keith backpedaled to the left. An arm was stuck out in his path, but he ducked under it and moved backwards quickly.

            “Really, now.”

            “Yep,” Keith said, his heart jangling in his ears.

            “You’re making a rather intemperate mistake.” The man’s lip curled as he spoke- showing his teeth… and then more, and more of them. They were sharp, the incisors curling down so far they nearly rested on his lower jaw.

            Human wavered. Canine instinct said to _run_. The latter won out. One end of the alley had a chain link fence- he hit it at a jump and scrambled over it. It was a blessing he had no time to think about the sounds behind him- as soon as he hit the ground on the other side he sprinted- two feet into something that had only slightly more give than a wall.

            He heard a soft “Oh, sh-” over him and crinkling paper. By the next time he looked up, a broad hand was extended in front of him. Keith looked up- a good ways up- into the open face of someone who looked about his age. “You all right?”

            Remembering what was in the alley behind him drove him past the usual awkwardness. He took the hand- and was neatly hoisted to his feet without effort or the stranger even freeing his other hand from the bag of groceries he was holding. “Uh-yeah. Sorry, gotta go.”

            He ducked around the other boy, moving at a bit of a checked pace at the reminder that other people were around, a few of them already eyeing him. Shoot, he didn’t recognize this street- didn’t know if there were parks or forests around or how to get there from here. He had to get to the woods- there, he might have a fighting chance, even against _that_ creep. Whatever he was, it wasn’t normal, but neither was Keith.

            A hand patted him on the back, nearly making him jump out of his own skin. What leaned over his shoulder wasn’t the tall man, but the guy with his groceries. “So _hey_ , are you hungry, because, listen, there’s this sorta kitschy coffee shop over that way and they do things with pumpkin spice no god would sign off on but it’s neat, if that’s your thing?”

            Before Keith could so much as parse that statement, the boy dropped to an undertone. “Listen, man, you’ve got the creep of Wall Street on your six right there- old white guy in a suit? And I’m _guessing_ that’s why you’re freaking out at like ten AM on a Saturday. Don’t look back too quickl-”

            Sure enough, there the tall man was, hands in his pockets, scowling even further as he was noticed, but following several paces behind them, forcing himself to look disinterested.

            “And you just looked, so, great, he’s gonna kill both of us now, way to go, no witnesses, that’s fine, that’s _great_ ,” the boy said breathlessly, still walking. “Do you even know what his deal is?”

            “No? I’ve never seen him before!” How was he so _calm_ about this? Did he not realize the danger he was in? “Listen, he’s-” it hit him there was no way to say this without sounding completely ridiculous. “… _weird_.”

            “ _Weird_?” The boy echoed, putting a stress on the word Keith wasn’t sure what to make of. A moment later, he fished his phone out of his pocket, held it up angled slightly over his shoulder like he was checking something on the screen and made a sneaky movement with his thumb, then lowered it and typed quickly.

            Keith risked another look back. The tall man was slowly, but steadily, gaining on them. The boy with the yellow headband was still staring at his phone. “Oh, way to go Lance, great time to _not_ answer your phone.”

            “Who are you texting?” he hissed, glancing back at the tall man. “We might get _killed_ and you’re _texting_ somebody?”

            The boy pocketed his phone. “Well I was _trying_ to be scientific about this, but, y’know, my best friend’s got no sense of urgency so okay, we’re doing this the hard way.”

            Before Keith could ask what that entailed, the boy had all but picked him up and hauled him into a niche between two buildings, still one-handed. This was narrower than the one before, bracketed on the far end with a brick wall and a dumpster. With a muffled thump, the boy set down his groceries and folded his hand an odd way- first two fingers extended, thumb crossed over the third- and made a quick series of gestures like he was trying to shoo a spider out of the air in front of him. Turning his back to this, he crossed his arms. “Okay seriously what does this guy want with you?”

            “I don’t _know_! He said something about something that didn’t belong to me and-” a shadow at the alley mouth. He made a grab for the boy’s arm.

            The tall man came around the corner- and straight into a firework of yellow light. He staggered back, snarling and clutching his face- an _awful_ smell arose, charred meat and rotten eggs. When the man straightened to glare at them, a broad swatch of his forehead and the bridge of his nose were burnt and blistering. His eyes were solid black, and he opened his mouth and hissed, three rows of needle-sharp teeth.

            “ _Okay_ that’s outta my comfort zone,” the boy said quickly, and rummaged in his grocery bag, swiping a black can of something and picking at the lid. To Keith, “Are you good at climbing? How good are you at climbing. Also, what are your feelings on trespassing.”

            Keith couldn’t take his eyes off the man. It was like a glass wall had been put up at the alley mouth- no matter how much he pushed against the substance, the man couldn’t reach them. Sometimes it seemed to give for a while, only to snap back- it had eaten through most of the man’s gloves at this point, and he was stepping back, taking the umbrella off his arm and shifting his grip on it until he held it in a fencer’s stance.

            At the same time, the boy scooted over to the wall, dumping white powder in a broad line across the alley mouth, and then just as quickly closing the can, dropping it back in his bag, and grabbing it in one hand, Keith in the other, and steering both towards the wall. “That was a time-sensitive question but I guess we’re just gonna find _out_. Hold this-” the grocery bag was dumped in Keith’s arms- “and try and stick the landing I’ve got jars in there.”

            “What do you mean stick the-”

            And then, with little regard for dignity or hesitation, Keith found himself boosted up and over the wall. To his credit, he did, in fact, stick the landing. This side of the wall was a small yard in back of what Keith guessed, from the pallets of plastic bags lying around, was a hardware store.

            A moment later, a slight scrabbling noise alerted him to the boy making it over the wall. “Okay- let’s not count on that holding and on him not having any friends. Go time buddy, move move move.”

            Keith, starting to resent how easy it was to be pushed around, resisted a little. “Where are we even _going_?”

            “Well, I’m not an expert, but I’m thinking some kinda residential area where we can hopefully deny him permission, and/or somewhere we can booby-trap in a hurry, and I happen to know somewhere that covers both categories, so we’re going to my apartment.”

            “Why residential?” They’d made it to the other edge of the yard, and Keith, not in a hurry to be thrown a second time, put the bag on his shoulder and jumped it.

            “Because my definitive radar’s not answering his phone but I’m pretty sure-” a bit of a grunt as the boy made it the rest of the way over the wall and slid down the other side, swatting some dirt off his cardigan, “-that guy’s a vampire.”

            Keith stared at him. “Are you serious?”

            “Yeah y’know because normal guys can definitely do that with their face.” The boy trotted to the street, glancing side to side for cars before hurrying across. “Don’t play skeptic with me, you’re the one on the lam from this guy, for, reasons you’re still not telling me.”

            “I _did_ tell you! I don’t _know_! I didn’t think vampires were _real_! And you just- did some weird thing with your hands-” he motioned, trying to remember the pattern of the gestures, “and just… stopped him?”

            They had come up short of an apartment building- the boy tapped the keypad, and then opened the door. “Yeah, well, it took me like three seconds, so it wasn’t any good. You wanna get inside before he, I dunno, tracks us by smell or something?”

            “He can’t do that.” With enough odors in the city, even _he_ couldn’t track someone he didn’t have a strong sample of, and there was no way that guy had anything of his to track with. “…Can he?”  
            “Look the fact that I happened to be carrying an entire thing of salt may have misled you, I’m not an _expert_. I don’t even have an actual decent night-vision camera.” The boy took the grocery bag back from Keith, hiked it on his shoulder, and headed up the stairs. “I don’t know what vampires can do, I didn’t exactly make charms for ‘what if I get attacked by a vampire today’, and I don’t really wanna find out when he climbs through my window tonight with a knife or something.”

            Keith stopped in the lobby. His rescuer paused about halfway up the stairs and looked back at him. “Then don’t. Look. I- shouldn’t be bothering you in the first place. He’s not after you.”

            “I mean, after I melted part of his face off, pretty sure he is.”

            Keith crumpled a little at that.

            The boy blinked. “Hey- look. It’s fine. If you really wanna make it up to me, you can…” he held out the bag. “Carry my groceries, or something.”

            That was a stupid concession, Keith thought as he took the bag.

            His rescuer apparently lived on the third floor. On the way, they passed windows and potted plants- this was a nice building. A little nicer than Shiro’s, though it made him feel guilty to think about. “Hey, uh-”

            “Hunk.”

            A pause. “ _What_?”

            The boy shrugged. “Seriously my name. Dunno what to tell you.”

            …Well, Keith thought, taking a bit of a closer look, it wasn’t _inaccurate_.

            “Hunk. You said you weren’t a _professional_ , but that sounds like you know _something_. You knew how to do that hand thing, and the salt-”

            “It’s kind of a hobby?”

            Keith forged ahead undeterred. “Do you know about _other_ things, besides vampires?”

            They’d reached a door, and Hunk had fished keys out of his pocket and slotted them into the lock. “Like… what?”

            The bubble that might’ve been building in Keith’s stomach popped. What was he doing? He didn’t even know this guy. He’d helped, and that was one thing, but, trusting him?

            When was he gonna remember that he wasn’t going to get lucky a second time? “…I dunno.”

            He _felt_ Hunk watching him, without even lifting his head. As it was, he didn’t look up until he heard the door open.

            Here, too, was rather nice, decently spacious- a wider area loosely partitioned into kitchen, living room, and a sort of dense closet space by the door.

            It was also occupied, by someone who bodily threw himself off the couch and came running over to greet them. “Hunk! You didn’t get eaten!”

            “Yeah, no thanks to somebody not answering his texts.” Hunk pulled his phone out and checked it. “Oh, I guess you did, like. Five seconds ago.”

            “I was _doing my homework_ , Hunk.” This other boy was a bit shorter than Hunk and lanky-built, with lighter brown skin and a short-cropped riot of chestnut hair. He glanced over at Keith, grinned, and stuck a hand out. “Who’s this?”

            Keith handed over the groceries. “Oh, uh. Sorry.”

            A pause.

            The other boy took the bag with a shrug. “‘Sorry’ is kind of a weird name, but, okay.” He scooted to the kitchen and set it on the counter.

            Oh, that had. That had been for a handshake, probably.

            Now was looking like a great time to go be a dog for a couple of hours in the woods, actually. He buried his face in his hands, took deep breaths.

            Hunk had stepped over to the door with a sharpie and was scribbling something into the wood grain. “Actually, yeah, if you’re gonna be bunkering down in our apartment we’re _probably_ on some kind of name basis. Unless you want to leave it up to Lance to give you a nickname, and, you don’t really want that.”

            A squawk came from the other side of the room. “Hunk, I give the _best_ names!”

            Hunk capped the marker. “You wanted to name the cat _Sir Meowsly_.”

            “Which is a _great_ name! For a cat, I mean,” the other boy jogged over. “I mean, this is a _person_ I’m not gonna call him-”

            Now just seemed an ideal time to cut out the middleman. “Keith.”

            Two heads turned. “What?”

            Keith folded his arms. “My name is _Keith_.”

            A pause. “Okay, Keith. Nice. I’m Lance.” He stuck out his hand again. This time, Keith shook it. “You’ve already met Hunk, the nice guy warding the windows,”

            Hunk, who was scribbling something under the frame, waved his free hand. “Also for the record, I’m not the one scrubbing these off before we get a house inspection.”

            “Aww, Hunk, c’mon! Aren’t we doing this in the spirit of being neighborly? Or- good sanitarians?”

            “That’s Samaritans,” Hunk said, and moved to another window.

            Lance waved his hands, making a ‘pssh’ noise before looking to Keith. “Anyway, what’s this with you and the vampire?”

            Why did everybody ask him like he _knew_ why a freaky guy in a suit attacked him? “He just said I had something that didn’t belong to me. I’ve never seen him before.”

            Lance cupped a hand to his chin, lofting his head as if to feign contemplation. “Nothing else weird happen to you lately? Like- someone breaking into your house, or, you were out for a jog and-”

            “The _weirdest_ thing that happened to me lately is my best friend _died_.”

            Silence. Good. Let them stew in it. He was done being polite. He stalked into the center of the room and sat down on the sofa, leaving his violin case by the door.

            Some quiet conversation at the edge of his hearing- Lance had gone over to Hunk. They were both watching him. Keith looked away.

            A hand on his shoulder. Hunk, expression soft. “Hey. Maybe we lost the guy. If we didn’t, he might wait until night before he does anything. Do you need to… call someone? Let ‘em know you weren’t kidnapped?”

            “No.”

            Well…

            A sigh. “Do you have a phone I can borrow?”

* * *

 

**_ChameleoRadical_**

_so I’m telling him right, like. I can’t be a vampire blood’s not halal and the guy’s still totally spaced out on me_

**_ChameleoRadical_**

_like I guess if you suffocate that starts killing your brain really fast but I don’t think that’s how it works for dead guys?? confirm?_

**_ChameleoRadical_**

_omg did you forget your phone again_

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_No. To both of your questions._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_You are correct in that undeath does not operate by the usual processes of tissue destruction. In fact, in most circles, undeath is defined as the suspension of ordinary processes of decay and deterioration._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_That said, you did just dig the man out of his own grave. I think disorientation is a bit understandable._

            A raw, full-throated _bellow_ cut through the spreading night. It seemed his quarry had discovered the ward after all.

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_Do excuse me. I have something to attend to._

            He pocketed his phone, and took a moment to evaluate his present features. It would do no good to appear soft and unassuming in his current endeavor- unfortunately, soft, to a degree, was the card his lineage had dealt him. It was a boon in most situations, but the additional hollowness, sharpness, the gray and bloodless undertone to his brown skin exacerbated well beyond its natural dimension that he now donned- these were necessary pleasantries, if one was to negotiate effectively in what the town became during nightfall.

            He strolled around the corner, as if merely arriving by chance. “Ah, Throk. How wonderful to see you again.”

            In his anger, the elder vampire was wholly inhuman- a snarling image of blackened eyes and elongate, emaciated form, pressing multiple clawed hands against the barrier that held him. “ ** _YOU_** _!_ ” he spat, rather impressively articulately given the number and arrangement of teeth his tongue presently had to find its way around. “This is an act of treason!”

            “Let’s not get overdramatic here, Throk. You are _well_ aware this region is under my jurisdiction. Unless you would care to personally explain to His Majesty why you’re intruding across firmly stated boundaries while he’s ailing so?”

            Throk gurgled furiously, abdicating to a low hiss. The subcutaneous fat began to return, slowly, to his features, teeth retreating back into the gum line like scolded hounds slinking under their master’s couch. He had fed, and recently, at that- but his gloves were speckled with burns.

            Precisely as he thought. “I do not take kindly to invasion. I believe I’ve made this very clear.” Particularly if Throk had been _hunting_ in his territory. Certainly, someone of Throk’s age and status was cautious enough to carry a reserve with them- but, also, someone of Throk’s status thought very little of how and where their ‘meals’ came from.

            Throk smoothed his jacket the way an affronted cat grooms itself. “ _Quite_ clear, if you’ve resorted to using _this_ foul art to secure it with traps.”

            He kept his distaste well away from his features. “I’m known to dabble. Let us not, however, get off our most _important_ topic of your intrusion.”

            Throk stiffened.

            “I’m sure you simply thought to _visit_ , and neglected to mention your presence.” He paced in front of the ward, thoroughly enjoying the way the man’s eyes followed him. “I cannot stress, however, that’s a perilous course of action. Certain _recent events_ have left me quite on edge. It’s obvious there’s some manner of Kindred running amok, and, as you’ve so wisely noted, I’ve set up _many_ such traps to attempt to find the beast.” A put-upon sigh. “Obviously, none of the Peerage would behave themselves so irresponsibly as to publicly butcher a mortal, but, a creature capable of creating such a spectacle could be just as much a peril to _us_.”

            There was a squirm, Throk regarding him with more concern. “What sort of traps?”

            “One does what one must to maintain the peace.”

            “…Indeed,” Throk said quietly.

             A silence fell between them that a passing car completely failed to dispel.

            He smudged out part of the circle with his foot, stepping back with a grand sort of gesture. “But come now the night is young, and I wouldn’t think to tarry you. After all, there is no reason we need be enemies.”

            Throk lofted to his full height, peering down the bridge of his nose. That was a new scar, there. “Of course. Do be _cautious_ , Prince. It would be a dreadful loss to the Peerage if this creature proved as dangerous as you believe.”

            And with that, Throk slipped off into the night.

            He waited until the elder was well out of sight before he checked his phone, though it chimed much sooner.

**_1313_ **

_lays it on really thick doesn’t he_

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_Follow him. See what he knows._

**_1313_ **

_I can find out a lot faster._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. Much as I would enjoy it._

_**1313**_

_still pretending to be nice to them._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_I prefer the term “My ass is covered.”_

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_In the meanwhile, I think it’s time I formally greeted our guest._


	3. Girls With Frogs' Eyes, Boys With Stoats' Teeth

**_AzuleYos_**

_Piiiiidge_

_**AzuleYos**_

_Pidge podge_

_**AzuleYos**_

_Pids pids pidgent pids_

_**AzuleYos**_

_I’m running outta stuff to call you c’mon pick up already_

_**bcFuckYouThatsWhy**_

_Y’know like_

_**bcFuckYouThatsWhy**_

_The advent of modern technology is amazing and all but this does not in fact mean I am constantly on my phone all the time_

_**bcFuckYouThatsWhy**_

_Also I’m not a demon you can summon by chanting nicknames a bunch of times._

**_AzuleYos_ **

_See you say that but you texted back really fast_

**_AzuleYos_ **

_So ha. Lancey wins._

**_AzuleYos_ **

_Anyway I need your brain_

_**bcFuckYouThatsWhy**_

_What part of it_

**_AzuleYos_ **

_The part that knows shit about vampires_

* * *

 

            When the morning came, Keith’s things weren’t waiting by the door, and he was still on the couch, with a blanket draped over him. The sounds and the smells told him Adam was cooking, so, by process of elimination, he supposed he wasn’t being forced to leave yet.

            Also, they hadn’t been murdered in the night by _vampires_. That was still so weird. Should it be that weird? He turned into a wolf. It was still weird. And… troubling, whether or not that guy had come back for more. Maybe he was just waiting to make sure that Hunk guy and that thing he did with his hands wasn’t around anymore.

            Whatever Adam was doing in the kitchen smelled nice. He wondered if he’d at least get to try that before he had to leave.

            Curiosity won out, and he dug himself out of the couch, and had made it halfway across the living room before a fast-moving streak of blond fur slammed into his stomach.

            To his credit, he didn’t crack his head on the floor on the way down. “Hey Kiko,” he croaked, over the sound of enthusiastic yips. “How’d you get here?”

            “I picked her up yesterday.” Adam’s voice floated in from the kitchen. “One of Shiro’s neighbors was taking care of her for a while, but, she was either going here, or to a shelter.”

            That stuck in Keith’s throat. Kiko didn’t seem to mind, though, wiggling happily in place and continuing to push her paws into his guts until he (gently) shoved her off so he could sit up and pat her head.

            “She likes you.” Adam sounded surprised.

            “Yeah, well, we were sharing the same space for a while.” Keith stared at him- he’d come out of the kitchen, but didn’t look mad.

            “I guess I thought-” the older man actually looked a little sheepish. “The _wolf thing_ might make it weird.”

            Oh. “Only when she doesn’t get why I won’t change to play with her at the dog park.”

            A small chuckle. “Seriously?” He saw the look on Keith’s face, and the smile dropped. “What?”

            “…Nothing.” That didn’t sound good. “It’s me being stupid.”

            That was the first time, staying here, he’d seen Adam seem really _laugh_ at something. But saying it was acting like there wasn’t a _reason_ for that.

            “Well… I’ve been stupid, so we’re even.”

            “What?”

            Adam paced back to the kitchen. Keith, unsure if that meant the conversation was over, trailed him, and was rewarded after a short pause: “Yesterday. You were trying to run away, right?”

            It was a stiffly casual question.

            Keith stuffed his hands in the pockets of his sweatpants. “Not… exactly.” It had sure occurred to him. “I just… needed some fresh air. Thought I’d go play, ‘cause it’s not like extra money hurts.” And of course, he’d come home empty-handed anyway.

            It took Adam a suspicious amount of concentration to turn over the bacon he was tending to. “All right. That’s. fine. I’d like it if you left a note next time, so the first thing I hear isn’t a text from a strange teenager letting me know you got attacked by…”

            “A vampire?”

            A spatula waved vaguely at the air. “I was gonna try really hard not to say that.”

            Kiko was dancing around Keith’s feet. He scratched under her chin to appease her. “…What am I even gonna do about that?” He doubted that creep had just… scuttled off because that didn’t work.

            “Well, your new friends seemed to have some ideas about it.”

            “They’re not my friends.” Maybe he wouldn’t mind the big guy, Hunk, but the chatty other guy, he’d pass.

            Adam was loading bacon onto a plate. “They got a- fine, a _vampire_ off your back. Call it what you will, I wouldn’t write that off. And besides which, I’ve been talking to at least one of them about it.”

            A phone chimed from the table, and Adam wandered over to glance at it. “Oh. There he is.” He nodded at the phone. “See for yourself.”

            Keith peered over at the screen.

**_CorporalSpaceCadet_ **

_We’d get involved anyway. This is a big problem for a lot of people, believe it or not._

**_AWorthwright_ **

_It doesn’t seem like it; considering I couldn’t find anything I’d call a credible source on this happening._

_**CorporalSpaceCadet**_

_Oh, tried to hit the books? I like your style but that’s a fast track to getting really personal with 15yos’ weird romance fantasies._

_**CorporalSpaceCadet**_

_Normally these guys are a lot more careful. Which is what bugs me. If the guy could carry a conversation and pass as human he wasn’t exactly starving to death, so he was after something big._

And then, at the bottom of the screen, the newest message:

            **_CorporalSpaceCadet_**

**** _Anyway, my sister and I are heading over now. All goes well, you should see us pretty soon._

            Keith looked up at Adam. “You gave them your address?”

            “What? No.” Adam looked at the phone. His eyebrows jumped, and then settled downwards behind his glasses. “I _didn’t_.” He set the plate down, picked the phone up, and typed rapidly.

            A pause, and then it jingled again. Adam’s frown deepened. “‘Don’t worry about it’,” he typed again.

            The canine in Keith was starting to get dangerous designs on that unattended bacon. He forced himself to refocus. Yeah, he had no idea what to make of the chatterbox, but, Hunk… Hunk had seemed all right. At bare minimum, if these guys were up to something, they could’ve just left him to the alleyway creep, or shook him down when he was alone in their apartment.

            He still didn’t know what it meant, _something in your keeping that has no business being there_. He hadn’t picked anything up in the woods. Before that, the funeral- the suit, but, if that was what they were after it was in pieces now. And that wasn’t _left in his keeping_ , anyway-

            A gleam in his memory- something glinting from his own dangling fingers.

_“I figured someone had dropped it, but, nobody came for it all day and Majorie said to take it. So… it can be yours, now.”_

Adam said something, but Keith didn’t hear him. He was already down the hallway, to where he remembered leaving the bag, yanking the zipper open, shoving bundled clothes aside, digging there at the bottom-

            It was about the size of a pocketwatch; a brassy-colored openwork cage holding a chunk of black stone shot through with vivid cyan veins. As it turned in the light, it twinkled, like a whole night sky trapped in a smooth-polished rock. On one end, a simple leather cord had been threaded through so it could be hung around the neck.

            “Keith?” Adam was at the door to the bedroom.

            Keith was shaking, he realized- the pendant was dancing in his hand. “I know what that guy was looking for.”

            Adam moved closer. “What _is_ that?”

            “Shiro gave it to me.” He could watch the words hit Adam, but breathlessly forged forwards: “He found it at work, and said no one claimed for it. That was a day before-”

            Before he’d gone missing. Before they’d found the body.

            Adam’s face took a turn for the unreadable. He held out his hand- Keith surrendered the pendant, watched him turn it over in his hand once, again, ghost his thumb over the surface and the hole in its center.

            It was into that silence the doorbell rang. Immediately, Adam pushed the thing back into Keith’s hand. “Hide it.”

            He grabbed a sock bundle, threaded it in and then stuffed that as far down in the bag as he could reach, zipping it shut. From there, he hesitated- Adam had already left, presumably to answer the door. He slung the bag over his shoulder, and ventured out in the hallway.

            The man in the doorway looked about Adam’s age, sandy hair held back in a loose ponytail from his bright, open face. He was dressed comfortably in loose layers, and lofted a gloved hand when he saw Keith looking around the corner before redirecting his full attention to Adam. “I’m really sorry about the scare. We wanted to get on this as fast as possible, before the trail gets cold.”

            “So you just found my house somehow.” Adam had a hand on Kiko’s collar.

            “Technically, the dog did, which is also how we’re gonna track down this vampire guy and get some answers out of him.” The man smiled in a way that might have been reassuring. He had… odd teeth, not the way the man in the alley had, but shorter and sharper than normal teeth should be. He smelled… odd, somehow, too, though Keith couldn’t put particular words to that.

            Behind him, at the bottom of the steps, was a short girl younger than Keith, hammering away on her phone with one hand. Her other had a work glove on it, and was occupied both with the glove’s match and a leash, leading to a mountain of black fur whose tongue lolled peacefully out of its mouth. Its eyes either reflected the light very brightly, or it simply had no pupils at all.

            Adam looked about as skeptical of ‘the dog’ as Keith felt, and tightened his grip on Kiko’s collar a little- she was wagging her entire body at the idea of getting to play with that great big friend down there.

            The scarred man grinned again, flexing his strange teeth. “Believe me. Beibei’s _great_ at this.”

            “And who _are_ you, exactly?”

            “Call me Matt. That,” he nodded at the girl, who looked up only briefly, “is my sister Pidge.”

            “What kind of name is _Pidge_?”

            “A great one,” she said neutrally, over the sound of her brother’s laughter.

            Keith jumped, not realizing he’d said that out loud.

            Adam still didn’t seem particularly convinced. “And you’re the… _experts_ that Lance and Hunk mentioned.”

            “I dunno if we’re _experts_ ,” Matt started.

            “We’re kind of experts.” Pidge interjected.

            “Comparatively, I guess,”

            “ _Comparatively_ experts. The important thing is, we’ve got a dog that can track vampires.” Pidge leaned forwards, pocketing her phone, and with a strangely cautious gesture, eased her glasses forwards a little.

            Her eyes were a sort of bronze color that stretched eyelid to eyelid, with broad, dark pupils.

            In the time it took him to blink, she’d straightened back again, shoving her glasses up the bridge of her nose. The next time she looked up, her eyes were ordinary- small hazel irises surrounded by white. “Huh. So, Lance was right.”

            Keith squirmed. It was one thing to make sense of someone doing obvious not-normal things with their body when they were trying to attack you and you didn’t have to think much harder on it than ‘probably should run’. It was another when someone did that in casual conversation. “About _what_?”

            Matt cocked his head, eyeing Keith before he nodded to himself. “You’re not totally normal yourself.”

            Keith clapped a reflexive hand over his mouth, glancing to Adam- were his eyes changed? He didn’t feel that sense of prickling _heat_ \- and, Matt was laughing.

            “Sorry. Our way of telling doesn’t work like normal villain. You look fine.” His expression shifted to something more sincere. “Promise. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

            Kiko had sat down, resigned to her fate of not being able to play with the big dog. Adam was watching both of the new arrivals sharply. “You realize I have no reason to believe you’re actually here to _help_ us, and not steal the same thing that other person was.”

            Pidge bristled- Matt shrugged as if it was of no consequence. “We’ve got perfectly selfish reasons for wanting to track down that vampire. Besides, if we could just find your house on our own, there’s no good reason we’d try to come in the front door.”

            Keith hitched the bag a little higher on his shoulder and stepped forwards. At Adam’s look, he flexed a weak smile. “I… think we can trust these guys.”

            _We_.

            Adam sighed. “…Well, you’d better come inside then, sometime before my neighbor gets curious.” He eyed the dog Pidge was holding, and headed to shut Kiko in the bedroom.

* * *

 

            “This is crazy.”

            The woman posted by the door grunted. “Yeah, you said that already.”

            Shiro directed a withering look at her. “Sorry, I thought you might want an update, considering it’s been forty-eight hours, and it’s not calming down.”

            “More like thirty-six. Y’know. Since it’s still daytime right now.”

            He took a moment to sit up and take in the room, the grayish way it was lit considering curtains were drawn across all of the windows. “Actually? I appreciate that. I couldn’t _tell_.”

            He was wearing a borrowed shirt. One of the sleeves had been knotted off, in a way he didn’t particularly want to think about.

            Thirty-six hours, Zethrid said.

            A period of time which he hadn’t slept, or eaten anything.

            He didn’t feel particularly the worse for it.

            He felt cold, but not in a particular way that it bothered him- no goosebumps, no shiver, just… cold.

            Not for the first time, he brought his remaining hand to his neck, made an attempt at passing it off like he had an itch. Pressed. Felt nothing.

            A nearby window rattled, hard.

            Zethrid stiffened, looked towards it. “Watch it,” she told him, arms still folded.

            In his mind, it felt a little like his missing hand- like what he’d read about phantom limbs. Only he could feel it under his nonexistent fingers- the frame, the wood, even the latch, the way it dug a little uncomfortably into the meat of his palm.

            Without moving his body, he shook it one more time, and then let go. The sensation cut out immediately. “Sorry. I’m not sure how that happened.”

            He wasn’t sure if she believed that or not- she watched him for a good while over the tops of her sunglasses before she just pushed them right back up again, pulled her phone out and started texting.

            Experimentally, he singled out one of the curtains. Imagined he was right there, could just curl his fingers and hook it, pull it forwards just a little.

            It flowed forwards, hung up on an imaginary finger. He released the sensation and it flowed right through where his ‘hand’ had been.

            Zethrid didn’t look up.

            _Interesting_.

* * *

 

            “Interesting.”

            “So do you know what it is?”

            Matt flicked the pendant between his fingers easily. “No idea. Mineralogy isn’t my major. Could be obsidian treated with something, could be meteoric iron. Who knows?”

            Keith resisted the urge to grind his teeth together.

            “I mean, this bit in the middle- it’s a self-bored stone.”

            That got his interest. “…A what?”

            “Piece of folklore,” Adam explained. “Something about a stone that’s had a hole worn through it by a river or something else in nature, looking through it’s supposed to ‘show you the true form of a fairy’ or something.”

            Matt leaned back, crossing one knee over the other. “Yeah, just like that old wives’ tale about how there were evil miasmas in the air that could make you sick. ‘Course, nowadays we call those _airborne pathogens_ and we’re a lot better at filtering them.” Propping his hand under his chin, he smiled at Adam. “Not everything that sounds unscientific is fake, sometimes it’s just under-researched.” He flipped the pendant over towards Keith with an easy gesture. “Try for yourself.”

            At first, holding it up to his eye, Keith didn’t see anything. Then his eye adjusted.

            Perched on the couch were two swirls of light. The smaller one was greenish-gold, studded with eyes and flowers in dense configurations, and with one appendage that vaguely looked like a hand, was pushing at the nose of a beige-furred dog who had its front paws rested on the armrest, wagging its tail hopefully. Its body was covered with a few odd seams, and there was a bright-colored mark on its head, the same as its eyes.

            The taller one was dappled in reds and golds, and had a great deal of small, sharp teeth, wound loosely around its body like a zipper. They twisted in a surprisingly familiar grin as he met the part where Matt’s eyes should be.

            He was about to lower the stone, but, as an afterthought, looked down at his own hand, not sure what he’d see. Coarse fur, maybe.

            Instead, he saw a grayish, overcast silhouette, textured somewhere between skin and hair, claws, but also human hands. And there, leaking out from breaks in the clouds of his skin, silvery light.

            Not entirely sure what to make of it all, he handed the stone over to Adam. “So that’s why the vampire guy wants it.”

            “Well, not exactly.” Matt shrugged, looking very bodily and un-mysterious. “Self-bored stones aren’t _that_ rare. And what you’re telling me suggests this guy wants it bad enough to kill over it.”

            “ _What_?”

            Adam was sitting very stiffly all of the sudden. He put the stone down in his hand. “…So, Shiro…”

            Matt leaned forwards. “It’d line up, wouldn’t it? He finds this thing, he gives it to you,” a small nod at Keith, “a day later he’s dead in a way that nothing normal would leave him like that, and day after _that_ someone comes after _you_.”

            Keith felt like he might be sick. He remembered what the man had said.

            ‘ _An_ associate _of mine bungled a certain operation_ ’

            Bungled? Was that just what Shiro was to that person? A vase bumped off a mantelpiece, just broken into so many pieces, _oops_ , _sorry_ , oh well we’ll just _move on with our lives_ -

            Adam’s hand on his shoulder surprised Keith- the claws that had been worming their way out of his skin retracted a little, and when he caught his breath, he ran his tongue over sharpened teeth.

            There was something cold and sharp in Adam’s eyes that made the screaming in Keith’s veins take notice. “Where do we find this person?”

            Pidge sat up suddenly. Her eyes were wild, bright, stormy, eager at that anger.

            Matt’s, however, were ice, despite their warm color. “We need to be careful. He may have fled town already. If not, he’ll probably be outside after sundown. Vampires like to think they own the streets at night.”


	4. Moonlight Tangle Tango

            “So you lost him.”

            “ _I_ didn’t lose him; you were in the house too.”

            “I wasn’t officially on guard duty. How did he get out? A window?”

            “Maybe he just went through the walls. He’s dead, isn’t he?”

            “He can’t do that.”

            “Can he? We were still figuring out _what_ he was.”

            Well. So much for sleeping in.

            The locks sprang to unravel themselves before he pushed the lid back, sitting up to regard the two others in the room. Acxa approached him first. “Lotor. Something’s come up-”

            He shoved his bangs out of his face with one hand. “I’m aware.” In an undertone, he added, “you weren’t being particularly quiet.”

            The way Acxa shuffled made him regret it. “…Ezor and Narti are already looking.” She stuck out a hand to help him up.

            “Well, then, let’s join their efforts, shall we?” He glanced across the room. “Zethrid- with me. Acxa- return to the grave. See if you can’t pick up a trace of any visitors. Whatever his nature, the recently deceased tend to try and return to the connections they had in life, one way or another.”

            Zethrid rolled her shoulders in a shrug. “If it were me, I’d be hunting my killer.”

            Vexing as the loss might have been, Lotor nonetheless could really appreciate the way these people thought. Their assistance was a luxurious thing to get used to. “A distinct possibility. Change of plans- everyone spread out. If anyone finds him, hang back and observe. See where he’ll lead us.”

* * *

 

            **_CorporalSpaceCadet_**

_Pickeny park, tonight. 9pm. You, me, my sister, and moon kid. Let’s shake a leg, and maybe break one._

            The temperature had been dropping unseasonably fast after dark, to the point that Adam’s breath was escaping him in pale wisps. The coat he was wearing- an understated affair in gray wool that fell past his knees- was good enough for the weather but not great. The better coat, a black parka with faux-fur trim on the hood and collar, had gone to Keith. It technically wasn’t Adam’s coat at all, but Shiro’s- he’d forgotten it at Adam’s house only a few days ago, and he’d simply held onto it, to return it the next time they saw each other.

            In another environment he might have smothered the hot, prickly feeling that crawled up his throat, but here, now, he let it rest on his tongue, savored the taste of it.

            That was _someone’s fault_. And maybe, just maybe, if there was a silver lining to everything ridiculous that had happened in the last few days, they were going to get to _pay for it_.

            “What if this is a bad idea?” Keith’s voice cut through that thought.

            “What do you mean?”

            “I mean-” pale fingers emerged from the parka sleeves. “I turn into a wolf. You’d think I’d _know_ something about this, but, I don’t. I didn’t even know about… hole-y stones until that Matt guy showed us. And that vampire could just… I didn’t even realize I was _talking_ to him until he said something weird. He just got in my head. Maybe he can do worse than that. And the best I can do is… sniff him? Tear his pants?”

            The anger Adam had been feeding didn’t want to hear that. The prudence in him aired that Keith had a point. Spite, caught in suspension between him, whispered that they could make that one more answer they dragged out of the man once they caught him. “This isn’t a vigilante execution. And besides which, we’re doing this as a _group_.”

            With two strangers, and their dubiously large possibly supernatural pet.

            He was starting to hate his own voice of prudence.

            “Well, hope you guys packed some stuff.” Matt crossed the grass to join them amiably, hands buried in his pockets. Today, he was dressed uniformly in black, down to smudges of it underneath his eyes. The bag for a tennis racket was slung over his shoulder. Adam was immediately certain that it contained anything but a tennis racket. “Because kid’s got a point. Vampires aren’t just guys in the middle of the countryside wearing capes with the collar popped. We’re banking on him being out of his environment and not expecting trouble, if he’s waltzing around in broad daylight.”

            Adam studied Matt’s clothes, noticing how many pouches there were. “…You’re not remotely trying to be inconspicuous, are you.”

            Bubblegum snapped by his elbow. Adam jumped, and Pidge regarded him dryly, shoving the wad of gum into one cheek before she retorted. “What, you think the vampire is gonna call the cops? ‘Hi, 911? I’m a creepy immortal jerk and a couple of meddling kids are coming for my kneecaps, please send a policeman alone to the spooky old house, preferably type O, that’s my favorite flavor’.”

            A _whuff_ of hot air drew Adam’s attention to a shoulder-height shadow that stared at him with familiar bright eyes.

            “What is _that_.”

            “Beibei.” Pidge stuck her gum on the sleeve of her bomber jacket.

            Keith squinted upwards. “He was a lot smaller this morning.”

            Pidge grinned, like she was showing off a favorite trick at a party. “He does that at night.”

            Adam put a hand in his pocket, felt his fingers slide over smooth plastic. “Right. Let’s go.” He looked to Matt. “Where to?”

            “Well, let’s find out.” A hand opened towards Keith. “If you don’t mind?”

            Keith hesitated before he surrendered the stone

            Matt came up beside Beibei, who wriggled in anticipation like a much smaller, much more ordinary dog. He rested a hand on the animal’s ruff, lips parting, briefly, over those strangely pointed teeth. He stuck his hand out, let the stone dangle right in front of its nose.

            “Beibei,” he said, softly, his gaze bright and sharp. “ _Hunt_.”

            The dog fell very still, eyes wide. Keith, watching it, stumbled back, but it didn’t even seem to notice. Its mouth opened, nostrils flared- drew one deep breath, then another.

            And then Beibei simply exploded. Pidge tore after it, rollerskates flashing their reflective tape. Matt ran, and Adam had to get a grip on Keith’s arm and bolt himself, to not be left behind. Futile, to try and spot the disappearing streak of black against black night- easier to look for a loose-tied tail of brown hair, or the robin’s egg-colored scarf Pidge had pulled over her mouth. The air bit at him- from his tongue all the way down inside, stinging until it opened stitches in his sides, but he didn’t slow down, couldn’t slow down, there was something, a rush, a chase- the _hunt_ , his heart pounding in his ears like the thundering of hooves.

            The tide swept them, carried them, and, yet, Adam was still Adam. It was Adam with the inconsequential pieces whetted away, not scared about being seen, able to look at Keith’s borrowed jacket and not touch the pain, because it was here, too, like his own monster dog, racing at his heels, lean and sharp, every tooth a fang, ready to bite, ready to wound, ready to drag it down.

            Vampires thought they owned the night, Matt had said. But humans- humans had built this city, humans had paved these streets, humans had been living here for thousands of years. Three generations before, humans had warred against each other, against governments, against environments, to come here, to America, humble people with everything they had left on their backs- people who wouldn’t be erased, who wouldn’t be silenced or driven out.

            His grandparents had more of a right to this town than Takashi’s killer ever would.

            He didn’t notice they had stopped at first, but his legs knew the rhythm without him; they braked smoothly, and he came to a halt between Matt and Pidge. He was sweating- he was overheating in his jacket, no matter how cold the night was. Every part of him felt alive, veins full of fire. “Why did we stop?”

            Pidge was looking just as restless. She’d pulled the gum off her jacket and was yanking and twisting it between her fingers, ripping it into pieces and stuffing it back together. Keith came to a cautious stop behind them, half-grinning. His eyes were… not human, somehow- rimmed in black, with small pupils, the blue intensified until it was nearly violet.

            They were past downtown, Adam realized- there was no way he could have run this far. He was athletic, not a marathoner- and yet, he felt fine, better than he’d felt in days, almost itchy, he wanted to keep running, he wanted to hunt-

            “Easy,” Matt said. “Don’t need you losing your head just because you got some old magic in you. We’re close, but that means we need to be careful moving in.”

            “Old magic?” Keith was still catching his breath.

            A soft, crooked grin from Matt. “I’ll tell you later.” He handed the stone back over to Keith. “Hide it.”

            Beibei set off again, this time slow, head to the ground, sniffing. Adam was caught in a strange position- the whatever-it-was had abated enough that he could tell it wasn’t a normal feeling, but he could still feel it jangling around inside. Part of him hated to feel it go- another part of him was terrified it had swept him up so easily.

            Pidge mashed together the last remnants of her gum, tossed it in her mouth, and swallowed it.

            These buildings were old, broken, mostly ignored- the occasional lights of gas stations and corner stores, and many more boarded up, cast in shadow- impossible to tell if they were unoccupied or simply disinterested in intrusion.

            Adam put his hand back in his pocket.

            The whites were coming back to Keith’s eyes slowly as he blinked. “I used to live around here.”

            “Really?” Matt sounded interested. “Nice neighborhood?”

            Keith shrugged. “Well, the guy who let me hide in his dumpster was all right.”

            There were several things about that sentence Adam didn’t want to consider right then, which was fortunate, because Beibei growled, back ridging upright.

            An answering rumble, deeper in tone, came from a shadow between two houses.

            Maybe it was not, in fact, fortunate at all.

            What stalked forth from the shadows was the size of a small car and cloaked in gray-streaked sable. Golden eyes, bright ones- unnervingly _aware_ , unnervingly _calm_ \- this close, Adam could see the silver hairs on its chin, the notch missing from one of its ears.

            But it was the voice from _behind_ them that captivated Adam’s attention. “Well, now, what fortune is this! Here, I thought I’d have to personally flush you out, but you’ve come all this way on your own. And brought _company_.”

            A tall, stocky man, the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to bare thick, hairy forearms. His wiry black hair curled around his face, framing eyes that glinted with an inhuman light. “I don’t suppose you feel like being especially cooperative and simply surrendering the keystone to me, now?”

            Matt pulled the zipper on his racket bag. Pidge put a hand on Beibei’s shoulder. Keith pushed one foot back, bringing his hands up to guard his face, but his expression was concerned. “Not the same guy.”

            A low chortle. “Of course not. Throk’s gotten it into his head that he needs to fall back, but the _princeling_ doesn’t scare me.” He fiddled with the clip of his tie, something blue-greenish twinkling there. “Now, then, _the keystone_ , if you please, or I’ll have no choice but to have Thace retrieve it.”

            The giant wolf had come to a stop, turning to the side. When the man spoke its name, however, it rumbled again, a low warning. Pidge flipped around to face it, Keith following her lead. Adam felt Keith’s back thump against his, and felt a limited amount of reassurance. At least if that thing lunged, they’d have warning.

            Matt hadn’t taken his hand off the bag. “What do vampires want with a seeing stone?”

            That prompted a full, well-bred laugh. “I’ve absolutely no reason to humor your ignorance.” He opened his hand, extended it to them. “ _The stone_. You will not like what happens if I ask again.”

            Matt hesitated, raised his hands. “All right. Let’s take it easy here.” He nodded to Adam. “Give him the stone.”

            _Ah_.

            Adam approached slowly, raising one hand, the other in his pocket. It closed around the familiar shape, settled right into position.

            The man was a full head taller than him, broad-shouldered and barrel-chested. When his lip curled back, he had two extra teeth in his mouth- wicked, pointed fangs, but that swept up from the lower jaw instead of down from above.

            “You behave, now, boy.” The man said softly. A clear warning.

            Adam remembered what Matt had said. Someone wanted that pendant- the keystone. Someone had wanted it badly enough to kill.

            He remembered when he’d been called in to identify the body. The limp angle the head had hung at, the gouge torn horizontally across the face. One entire arm missing.

            He remembered Takashi. Alive, happy, frustrated, arguing- everything he’d admired, everything he’d been exacerbated by, everything he’d loved.

            He drove the taser as close to the center of the body as he could and fired it.

            The man staggered back, cried out- but didn’t drop, and too fast he was back upright, snarling, inky blackness spreading throughout his eyes, lunging forwards- a horrible _shriek_ rose behind Adam. He stumbled, tripped, fell- the man pounced-

            An arc of silver light, a breath of cold air. Matt, already moving forwards for another swing with the sword. The vampire danced backwards, surprisingly lightfooted, caught himself.

            He was taller now, looking like he’d been stretched out- the bones of his ribcage pressed against the fabric of his shirt. Claws bristled from his fingers, ears stretching to points like a bat’s. His teeth extended until they didn’t fit in his closed mouth any longer, leathery wings tearing their way out of his back. “You think to _toy_ with me, you base creatures?”

            Out of the corner of Adam’s eye, he saw the wolf, bleeding from one side of its muzzle- Beibei was dancing around it, snarling and snapping. Another dark shape, longer, lankier, a familiar parka clinging oddly to its extended frame, blood on its teeth-

            Matt tackled him back to reality, and a moment later, the ground he was sitting on exploded. The vampire, nearly ten feet tall now, let out a harsh, barking sound that might have been a laugh and aimed again, fingertips glowing dark red.

            Adam rolled to his feet and ran one way- Matt bolted the other, running towards the wolf. The vampire set his attention on Adam, and lunged, coming in for a swipe with those glowing claws.

            The good news was, he was a much bigger target to _hit_ now. Adam fell back, tucking his chin to keep his head from cracking on the concrete, and jammed the taser up into the stomach. This time, he clicked the trigger twice, rewarded with an inhuman hiss.

            A huge hand cuffed him across the face, glasses skittering away. Blood ran into one of his eyes- in that moment of distraction, a booted foot slammed down onto the hand with the taser. He heard something crunch.

            The vampire stood over him, a true supernatural monster in all his glory. He crouched, shifted his boot off Adam’s arm to pluck him upright with all the irreverence of someone handling a doll.

            “Where is the keystone?”

            Adam caught as much of a breath as he could. “Go to hell.”

            A roiling chuff escaped through the forest of teeth. “Petty words to waste your last breath on.” He leaned forwards, opened his mouth to position his jaws around Adam’s throat.

            He remembered the body. Remembered the marks left on the neck.

            Adam closed his eyes. It probably wouldn’t hurt for long.

            Behind his eyelids, something exploded in violet.

            The vampire didn’t drop him as much as throw him- he tumbled to a stop against a building, jarring his broken arm. A cat yowled close to his ear.

            He made a clumsy attempt pushing up on his good arm, trying to make sense of the swimming world. A vast, dark blob- the vampire. Something small, bright, crackling with pulses of purple stood between them. Humanoid- white-haired, Adam processed after a moment.

            Had only one arm.

            “Insolent PEST!” The vampire thundered.

            Shiro bolted forwards, weaved under the arm and swung his fist hard. Another crackling burst.

            Someone was hauling Adam to his feet. “Shiro-” he struggled forward, futilely as the arms proved not entirely helpful. “ _Takashi_!”

            The grip on his shoulders faltered, renewed itself. “Ugh- Narti, can’t you help me out with this guy?”

            A new hand- a cold, icy hand on the back of his head.

            And then.

            Something nudging him, prodding at the side of his head. “How long was he out?”

            “Is it more than five seconds that it’s supposed to be a concussion?” That sounded like Pidge.

            Adam bolted upright, narrowly missing Matt’s head as the latter ducked backwards. “Easy.” Matt raised his hands. “The big and ugly squad bailed.”

            The street was quiet. Empty, save for the four of them.

            That was wrong. Someone should’ve- there was someone who wasn’t there. Adam put a hand to his head, staving off a sudden headache. “…What-”

            It hit him. “ _Takashi_.”

            Keith straightened suddenly, as much as he could in canine form. Matt and Pidge hung back in confusion, exchanging a look.

            “He- he was there. I saw him. That thing had me by the neck and-” There was nothing. “It couldn’t have been anyone else.”

            A distant sound- Beibei and Keith both perked their ears up. It took Adam a while to process it as a siren. Matt frowned, hauled Adam to his feet. “We need to get out of here. Do you think you can walk?”

            “I think I-” he stumbled. “…No, I guess.”

            A large, dark head pushed its way under his good arm. Keith nudged upwards slightly.

            Matt blinked. “…That’s not a bad plan, actually. Pidge, help me boost him up.”

            Between the two of them, they loaded him onto Keith’s back, where the hood of the parka offered at least something he could hang onto. All the same, he nearly fell off when they started moving- he felt _terrible_ , weak and shaky and helpless.

            He squeezed his eyes closed, tried to focus on that memory.

            It had been him. It _was_. Shiro, bright and strange and… what had happened? He’d heard something. Something had happened.

            Maybe he _had_ hit his head. Maybe nothing had been there.

            …But no, something had to have spooked the vampire. He rubbed his throat, feeling the unbroken skin. That guy’d been ready to eat him- and something had happened.

            Matt wasn’t looking him in the eye, walking alongside with his hand on Keith’s side as if he expected Adam to pitch off it. At some point, Pidge had dozed off on his back- he shifted her a bit higher as they walked. Keith was favoring one of his legs as he walked.

            Beibei plodded behind them, head hanging low.

            Slowly, the sound of the sirens faded in the distance behind them.

* * *

 

            They found him about a block away, standing in a small alley.

            “I’ll admit it, that was impressive.” Zethrid crossed her arms. “You’ve got some real juice in you.”

            The eyes that glared in her direction had electric violet pinpricks in the center of the pupils. “And you’d know about that,” he offered acidly.

            Ezor shrugged. “Nothing personal. We can’t exactly look you up in the encyclopedia of the dead.”

            “Well, now that we all _know_ about it,” he turned to face her. Sparks were still prowling the length of his body, making the single part of his hair not close-cropped to the scalp float in place. “If you’re just going to lock me in a room again and not explain anything, you can _forget_ it.”

            Zethrid’s sunglasses glinted. “Oh, yeah?”

            Ezor patted her hard on the elbow. “Kay, Babe, let’s not have the zombie heavyweight semifinals like twenty feet from the cops, okay?”

            “You don’t let me have any fun.”

            She rose on tiptoe to kiss her cheek. “I’ll make it up to you.”

            Shirogane’s expression hadn’t shifted a fraction. It was admittedly, kinda freaky.

            “…Look. You died and came back as _something_ and there’s some kinda vampire turf war going on. That’s a lot to deal with. But you’ve actually gotta _deal_ with it, so, like, right now you can go haunt your friends and loved ones or mope around your grave or something- _or_ you can come with us, and actually try to get to the bottom of this.”

            “You didn’t tell me anything before. Why should I trust you on that now?”

            “Oh, y’know, because all those cool new powers you’re figuring out might tear your body apart, or burn you out so fast you die again for real.” Ezor folded her arms. “Coming back from the dead isn’t like winning the lottery. You don’t just get a bunch of superpowers and a new lease on life. So, _Sparky_ ,” she slapped his arm lightly, vindicated when it didn’t shock her, “you wanna find out about that stuff the hard way, or the way that comes with air conditioning and actual furniture?”

            Slowly, the spectral glow dimmed to almost nothing.

            “Yeah,” Ezor said softly. “That’s what I thought.”

* * *

 

**_RidinDirty_ ** _sent a file: thisdouche.png_

_**RidinDirty**_

_Guy that our new mystery friend scared off. Ezor got the pic with her phone when she and Narti were pulling the other guy outta there._

_**RidinDirty**_

_Who is he?_

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_Zethrid this may astonish you but I do not actually have every vampire in the tri-state area and their awakened form memorized._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_Regardless, I’ll consult my sources._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_In the meantime, Acxa was able to return some results on our guest._

**_PrincipallyAnonymous_ **

_It may pertain to that human who was at the scene._


	5. The Morning's Consequences

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_Hey Acx I really hope you guys are having a better time r/n than we are_

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_Corporal Sparkpants is like trying to find out if he has eye lasers or something and I really don’t think he took the Undeath And You 101 lecture well_

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_Like it’s worse than when he was just spaced out on me first because this time it’s totally focused and also he hasn’t stopped leaking lightning any time he gets actually mad_

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_My name is only four letters long did you really cut one of them off as a nickname._

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_Uh, yeah??? I have an image to maintain????? smh Ax_

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_…Anyway._

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_Narti only got so much from that man’s head when she fogged him to cover your presence. We don’t have much to find him with._

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_And according to the source I procured, he hasn’t returned to the grave since the funeral._

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_I mean just getting a look at the guy I think we can rule out brother unless they’re adopted_

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_I mean he was kinda handsome if dudes are your thing? Maybe they were dating? Guess you wouldn’t get much if you tried to sniff down Sparky here_

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_I’ll think of something._

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_How’s Lotor?_

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_Uh_

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_Quiet_

**_ChameleoRadical_ **

_I mean that’s all I got unless you want me to like go kick his fucking box open like HEY LOTOR YOU STILL FAINTIN ON US LIKE A SOAP OPERA HEROINE_

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_So he’s resting at least?_

**_LunarRadiation_ **

_That’s good._

* * *

 

            “I’m not going to be able to make it today. Injuries.”

            “ _Oh no, what happened?_ ”

            Adam looked at himself in the mirror. The abrasions from the sidewalk were more forgettable than the two large claw swipes, both bracketed off with wads of gauze. He had a black eye blooming on that side, and that was to say nothing for the greater constellation of bruises and scrapes he’d discovered getting ready for bed last night.

            “I was hit by a car.”

            This set off a twitter of agitation from Evelyn, which he had to reassure- no organ damage, no, just a broken arm, yes, he’d gotten it looked at, don’t worry- send his regards to everyone.

            When he hung up, he realized Keith was watching him.

            “…You’re good at that.”

            Adam blinked. “What?”

            Keith eased into a chair. He was wearing a borrowed pair of Adam’s pants, safety pinned up the leg so he wouldn’t trip on them. “Lying. Acting like everything’s normal and fine.”

            He tried to parse what exactly was in Keith’s tone. “I’ve got enough to deal with without my manager worrying I’m getting myself attacked by gangs. Besides. I don’t think she’d believe me if I told her the truth.”

            It was just lucky he’d saved the sling from the last time he’d broken an arm.

            Keith stared at the kitchen table, his eyes lowered. All things considered, he’d come out of it light- a few scrapes and scratches, but not as many as Adam had expected considering the size of the beast he’d fought.

            “Did you really see Shiro?”

            Adam’s breath caught in his throat.

            Keith looked up at him in an expression plagued by the battleground of hope and doubt. “Last night.”

            It was easier to talk not looking at those eyes. “Maybe. I’m not sure.”

            “…You seemed pretty sure.”

            “I’d also just hit my head and broke my glasses.” He adjusted his backup pair on his nose, hating the way they sat on his face. It was the easiest thing to be mad at right now. “…Keith. He’s dead. We both know that. I saw the body.”

            “But maybe he didn’t _stay_ dead.” Keith pushed to his feet. “Look, we- _I_ had no idea about vampires, or… any of this. Who’s to say what _more_ is out there we don’t know?”

            He didn’t need that hope. He really, _really_ didn’t need that ‘maybe’.

            “I’m making breakfast.” Toast and bacon, he decided. Eggs were a pain to crack one-handed.

            The toaster hissed, the meat sizzled. Wordless things that filled the space, dulled the ache in his arm, things that nearly, _nearly_ derailed him from his thoughts.

            If it was Takashi, what did that mean? What did it mean that he hadn’t contacted Adam- or stuck around?

            What had happened to him? Death- at least one side of death was a medical certainty. This business of coming back from it… Who was to say how much of him was left?

            He set a plate in front of Keith, put himself in the seat across from him. It was awkward, eating without being able to move his left hand, but he was accustomed enough to the right.

            At the end of the day, bacon was just meat. Part of an animal once, but, changed, even before it was cooked. You couldn’t put a bunch of bacon back together around the organs and bones and make an animal.

            The state Takashi had been in when he died- well… someone had to have put him back together. The funeral home hadn’t done it- they’d talked to him, frankly, about the pieces. About the difficulty in making so much _meat_ look presentable as a corpse.

            He stood up, brushed the untouched bacon onto Keith’s plate as he passed. “I’m going for a walk.”

            Kiko met him at the stairs, bounding in place, having heard that last word. Right. She- she needed to go out, too. Her leash had been with the other things he’d taken from the apartment- he redirected to the bedroom, found it. Struggled for several minutes to clip it onto an animal caught in the throes of jubilation.

            The door opened to reveal a young man in an army-green jacket, his hand posed halfway to the doorbell. “Oh.” He winced, taking in Adam. “Jeez. Pidge said you guys had a rough night.”

            He placed him then- this was one of the two who’d helped Keith on Saturday. Adam couldn’t remember his name, but he remembered the blue eyes, hair that stuck up in front like he ran his hands through it a little too much. Looked about Keith’s age.

            He remembered he should probably say something. “How do most people look after they try to fight a vampire?”

            The boy’s mouth twitched and he looked away for a moment. That was about as much time it had taken for Kiko to come up and sniff his hand, and he was immediately distracted by petting her. “Well, I was gonna tell you something, but if you’re just walking the dog, I can walk and talk.”

            Adam eyed the street. He guessed that it wasn’t particularly occupied this early in the morning- not by people who’d get close enough to hear the conversation. At the same time, as fundamentally absurd as everything that had happened to him since Thursday was, there was something about actively discussing it in public that gave him pause.

            Kiko, at the end of her leash, gave him a look that for all the world seemed like canine exasperation.

            He closed the door, fumbled his keys, had to hitch the leash onto his elbow before he could pick them up and turn the lock properly. The kid had the decency not to say anything, though Adam didn’t really like the look in his eye when they actually set out.

            It was an unexpectedly nice day. Clear, sunny, nearly the right temperature for Adam to forget that he probably should have brought a coat. His breath escaped through his teeth in white clouds.

            Where was Takashi right now? Was he aware of the weather? Did he feel the cold?

            A yawn interrupted his thoughts.

            “Sorry,” the kid stretched. “Stayed up way too late talking to _relatives_.” There was some interesting quality in his tone Adam couldn’t place.

            “Sounds unpleasant.”

            An ambiguous back-and-forth motion with one hand. “Eh, they’re not… _bad_? Mostly, they just don’t get time zones. Mom doesn’t talk to them much anymore and they usually gripe about it. They’re not on _bad_ terms, just… nobody’s got time for that unless it’s important.” Another yawn. “Anyway, that’s where I got the information.”

            “You talked to your relatives about this?”

            Somehow the kid seemed to find this very funny. “They live in the middle of nowhere. Even if they _had_ neighbors they wouldn’t want to talk to them about it.”

            “And electronically?”

            A shake of the head. “Technophobes. Kinda understandable but still. _Anyway_ , the important thing is… that weird stone?”

            Adam stiffened a bit, glancing around.

            The kid gave him a smile- one that was quiet, and surprisingly understanding. “Pidge told me about it. Which is why the whole thing with the relatives happened. Their thinking is, it’s, uh…” he cupped part of his forehead between thumb and forefinger, mouthing something under his breath. “A _piece of something larger_. Did you get any kind of lead on that?”

            Oh. He meant last night. “…No. We didn’t find the individual we were looking for, but someone else was waiting for us instead. He had some kind of animal with him, and-”

            And turned into a giant bat-winged monster with tusks.

            There, that nearly made sense. He could say it. But something other than awkwardness made it catch in his throat.

            His _throat_.

            That thing had been about to kill him. The same way something _like_ that had killed Takashi.

            Kiko’s leash stopped just shy of a tree she might have liked to sniff, and she tugged against it, reminded him to keep walking.

            “Shoot, why can’t things be more like video games?” The kid didn’t seem to notice the pause. “Y’know, where the guy opens with this big monologue about he’s Lord Whatshisface and you’ll never defeat him so just surrender and turn over the-”

            Something in the wording caught at his mind. “Keystone.”

            “What?”

            “He called it a keystone. And he wanted us to give it to him.”

            A bit of a knowing look. “So, that’s when you punched him?”

            The morning was peaceful. The street was empty. Kiko had gotten to her tree and was peeing on it triumphantly. “Hit him with a taser, actually.”

            A startled guffaw escaped. He caught sight of Adam’s expression out of the corner of his eye and the smile dropped. “Sorry. Sorry. It went bad but. Still. Jeez. How many people get to say they hit a vampire with a taser?”

            They had nearly made it to the top of the hill. “Was there a point to this conversation besides that bit about the keystone?”

            “Oh- shit, yeah. So, first- finders’ keepers on magic maybe evil relics unless there’s a good reason not to, and all- you own the house?”

            “It’s a duplex.”

            “-Yeah, so, sometime when it’s convenient we can have Hunk come over and ward the place for you so, y’know, an army of the night doesn’t bust in and murder you in your sleep.”

            He had admittedly been sort of worried about that.

            “How reliable are those wards?”

            “What, Mullet didn’t tell you about Hunk melting that guy’s face? He’s good at this.”

            It took a moment to click. “I wasn’t aware that qualified as a- wait. _Mullet_?”

            “So I forgot his name!”

            Oh, that made this situation a bit less awkward.

            “The _important_ thing is, if it’s a piece of something more, _especially_ if it’s a key for something, then, the great news is, you can totally give up on trying to track that vampire guy and getting into any more midnight fights. All you’ve gotta do is find out what it _goes_ to, and beat ‘em to the punch.”

            Well. At least _part_ of it sounded reasonable enough as a proposition. “And, how are you proposing we do that?”

            “Well, I know a guy. Or, _Pidge_ knows a guy. Actually, it’s two guys. Anyway, they’re both like major super eggheads so if anybody on the planet can figure out what that thing is, it’s them. Of course they’re super busy so that’ll take a while, and, in the meantime…”

            And, very abruptly, Adam was being regarded with a look of genuine, soft concern, one so completely serious and focused that it seemed almost jarringly out of place.

            “You _really_ need to make sure you’re okay, and didn’t get hurt in a way that’s gonna kill you.”

            The shift in tone and topic all at once caught him in the chest. “I- don’t have a concussion.”

            “Pidge said you were out and she didn’t know how long. That’s serious.” A preemptive hand-wave. “And I get it. You don’t exactly want to tell the ER you were fighting a vampire. Which is the main reason why I came.”

            The house was back in sight again- they’d looped the block without Adam realizing it, having fallen easily into the usual beat he walked, just with a dog and this… strange young man, as well.

            The kid fished in his pocket, extended a scrap of paper with an address. “She works independently, but, she’s trustworthy and she does charity work if you’re dealing with _weird_ stuff. Just, y’know, don’t get her started about Russian literature.” A cautious smile. “And promise me you’ll get that checked out sooner, rather than later.”

            He might’ve said something sharp- he really didn’t need to be babied by someone the age of his own students- but something about it…

            A familiar argument. A familiar request. One he recognized, usually from the other side.

            Negotiating that particular stone in his throat, he settled on the less sharp-feeling logic that considering his injuries weren’t going to go away, he’d probably want some kind of doctor’s note to corroborate his story.

            He took the paper, eyed its contents. “Your handwriting’s terrible.”

            An earnest guffaw. “Veronica says it looks like somebody set a mouse loose on the page.” He suppressed another yawn, shaking his head. “Anyway, I’ve gotta- y’know, actually catch up on sleep. Don’t be a stranger, okay?”

            “Wait.”

            The kid paused.

            “I- didn’t get your name.”

            “Oh- I’m Lance. You’re, uhhh…”

            “Adam.”

            Lance snapped his fingers. “Right! Okay. Great. You… gonna be okay, dude?”

            “I’ll survive.” He’d need to unlock the door, which was a somewhat frustrating prospect, but- as coincidence would have it- the matter was taken out of his hands.

            Not that he was especially grateful about it, as it came paired with the sight of Keith, standing in the frame, still hanging onto the knob and shaking slightly.

            Before Adam could say anything, he swallowed a breath, and, what tumbled forwards out of his mouth:

            “ _That guy from last night showed up after you left._ ”


End file.
